De-gunk your Windows XP
Here is an easy way to speed up your Windows XP machine. When you install new software, many programs will set themselves (or ‘helper’ programs) to auto-start every time you reboot. These background processes will eventually gunk-up your system. To view which programs are auto-starting at bootup do this:
Start -> Run -> Type ‘msconfig’ -> Click on ‘Startup’ tab. You can now un-check any items you don’t want to launch on startup.
You will typically find a load of junk in here such as iTunesHelper, qttask, realsched, point32. You may also find some trojans or viruses. It is safe to uncheck all items here, as only non-essential items are listed. To get details on what an item is, search for it at the WinTasks Process Library.
June 13th, 2005 at 12:20 am
MSConfig wasn’t really designed for this since it doesn’t remove those startup items from the registry; it just puts the computer into a “Selective Startup” mode that’s more a temporary debugging tool than a permanent solution.
Fortunately, it does tell you where in the registry these settings are hiding, so you can remove them yourself.
June 13th, 2005 at 2:07 am
I noticed that several helpers of my antivirus software – TrendMicro in my case – are started here. So I guess it is best to closely watch the directory of the applications that are listed here to avoid disabling the automatic update of security software.
Otherwise it is a nice way to speed up the boot sequence. Thanks for the tip.
June 13th, 2005 at 6:39 am
That list you gave a link to is good but I prefer the one from Sysinfo: http://www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php . It’s more comprehensive and allows a search along with more info on each item to boot.
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June 22nd, 2005 at 3:59 pm
Fan-bloody-tastic! I used this tool once before, then forgot how to get it back. Cheers!
July 27th, 2005 at 2:58 am
Just a little note on the qttask: even if you remove it from your startup using msconfig, that nasty little bugger still starts each time you boot so the best thing to do is go into your Quicktime install directory and renaming it to something like qttask.old or deleting it completely.
September 29th, 2005 at 8:41 pm
Very helpful thanx
October 10th, 2005 at 2:01 am
It is NOT safe to uncheck everything in this box. You will probably want ZoneAlarm to keep working, as well as your antivirus program. Also, nVidia graphics cards use a startup item which you will probably want to run.
But yeah, there are a lot of things that don’t need to always load with Windows: qttask, realsched, winampa, quickbooks update, to name a few.
November 16th, 2005 at 8:49 am
Hello, i have a site about music, can i place a link to your website?
February 8th, 2006 at 7:53 am
I should point out that, if you install recent versions of QuickTime, WinAmp & RealPlayer; you can configure these programs not to load-up in system tray. These can be configured from the program’s PREFERENCE or TOOLs.
Please note that you have to be using the latest versions of the software I have mentioned to be able to configure the software not to load on start-up. The older versions do not have this option.
These are very smart moves on the part of the program writers.